Welcome to: Europe, the tropical archipelago that formed 100 million years ago and, following floods, ice ages, and other events, transformed into the geographically and biologically diverse region we know today.

Look for: the "hell pigs" of the Oligocene period, the two-foot long proto-hedgehog Deinogalerix, and Europe's first hominids -- the human-Neanderthal hybrids that colonized the continent 38,000 years ago.

What's next? Confronting the existential threats of climate change, according to Australian author and paleontologist Tim Flannery.

What it is: a sobering look at the existential threats humanity may face once ANI (artificial narrow intelligence) begets AGI (artificial general intelligence), which in turn will beget ASI (artificial superintelligence).

What does that even mean? Once machines reach human levels of intelligence, it's only a matter of time before they attain superintelligence -- and our inferior human brains can't even fathom how that will play out.

What it's about:journalist and documentary filmmaker Luke Dormehl surveys the field of artificial intelligence from its Cold War origins to the not-too-distant future.

Reviewers say: Ray Kurzweil, writing for The New York Times, calls Dormehl "the rare lay person...who actually understands the science (and even the math) and is able to parse it in an edifying and exciting way."

Try this next:George Zarkadakis' In Our Own Image, a comprehensive history of "thinking machines."